Systems and methods herein generally relate to registering a newborn child at birth and, more particularly, to devices that generate an encrypted birth registration report according to requirements of the location of the birth.
The World Health Organization, UNICEF, and the United Nations published a joint study in 2000 on the problem of birth registration. This study cited an estimated 50 million babies—more than two fifths of those born—are unregistered. The root causes of non-registration are often economic and political, or non-existent basic services in remote and underdeveloped areas.
The World Health Organization defines a live birth as a baby that breathes or shows any other sign of life after delivery, irrespective of the duration of pregnancy. The United Nations view is that all babies born alive should be registered and their existence recognized whatever their gestational age and regardless of whether they are still alive at the time of registration. Not all countries adopt this internationally recommended definition. In the Philippines, for example, a baby with a gestational life of less than seven months is not regarded as live-born if the child dies within 24 hours of delivery. In this case, the baby's birth and death go unrecorded. However, if a full-term baby is born dead, it is considered a fetal death and recorded as such; other countries have yet to apply definitions of live birth nationwide. Some states in Mexico, for example, follow the international recommendations, while others do not require the registration of the birth or death of children who die within 24 hours of delivery.
A child who is not registered at birth is in danger of being shut out of society—denied the right to an official identity, a recognized name, and a nationality. These children have no birth certificate, the ‘membership card’ for society that should open the door to the enjoyment of a whole range of other rights including education and health care, participation, and protection. It shows that a child has a place, and a stake, in all three and offers protection against discrimination and neglect, determines a child's treatment in the justice system, and lasts a lifetime—guaranteeing an individual's right to take their place in the social and political life of their country.
When more families stayed in one place for generations, birth registration may have seemed less important. Every individual was well known to the surrounding community. However, with accelerating globalization and the growing movements of people both across and within national borders, having a recognized legal identity has become crucial. Denial of this basic right means denying not only the right to an identity, enshrined in Article 7 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), but many other rights to which every citizen is entitled.